Journalists detained by police
RSF/IFEX) – RSF has criticized the Pakistani authorities’ heavy-handed treatment of the media as journalists tried to cover the attempted return from exile of opposition politician Shahbaz Sharif, the brother of former prime minister Nawaz Sharif. Intense official pressure was brought to bear on the private television station ARY Digital TV, a CNN journalist was placed under house arrest and police roughed up several journalists who were trying to cover the event in Lahore.
“The way in which the Pakistani authorities tried to hide the return of this opposition politician shows the government’s lack of openness to freedom of expression and democracy in general,” the organization said in a letter to Information and Broadcasting Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed.
RSF demanded an explanation for the pressure brought to bear on the privately-owned media to stop them from covering the event, and called for the punishment of police officers who manhandled journalists in Lahore.
On May 9, 2004, ARY Digital TV pulled an interview with Shahbaz Sharif, president of the opposition PML (N) party, shortly before it was to air. The interview was intended to mark the politician’s return from exile. Executives of the British station said the decision was the result of “huge government pressure.” The television presenter gave no explanation on the air, but said, “We believe in freedom of expression.”
On May 11, police placed Syed Mohsin Naqvi, a Pakistan-based producer of the American cable television station CNN, under house arrest to prevent him from interviewing Shahbaz Sharif. The security forces used the pretext of a bomb alert to enter the producer’s Lahore home without proper authorisation.
Also on May 11, police prevented journalists from reaching Lahore international airport to witness the opposition politician’s return from exile. Several reporters, including a BBC crew, who travelled in the same plane as Shahbaz Sharif, were arrested, questioned, searched or roughed up by commandos who surrounded the plane after it landed.
Police manhandled Zafar Abbas, the BBC’s Islamabad correspondent, and confiscated his passport and equipment. Abbas and a BBC cameraman were then held in a police van for one hour. Police also seized a video cassette.
In addition, a journalist from an English-language daily and a reporter from an Urdu-language daily were beaten at a police checkpoint at the entrance to the airport. Secret service agents were also deployed to identify journalists in the airport zone. Security forces checked and harassed opposition supporters in Lahore to forestall any pro-Sharif demonstrations. Shahbaz Sharif himself was expelled to Saudi Arabia after spending less than two hours in Pakistan.
Source: IFEX / RSF
Date:5/14/2004
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